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| Type | Public (LSE: YELL) |
|---|---|
| Founded | 2001 |
| Headquarters | Reading, England, UK |
| Key people | Bob Scott, (Chairman) John Condron, (CEO) |
| Industry | Media |
| Products | UK:Yellow Pages, Yell.com, Yellow Pages 118 24 7;US: Yellow Book and Yellowbook.com and in Spain: Paginas Amarillas and PaginasAmarillas.es |
| Revenue | £2,18.7 million (2008) |
| Operating income | £55.5 million (2008) |
| Net income | £26.7 million (2008) |
| Employees | circa 1,350 |
| Website | www.yellgroup.com |
Yell Group plc (LSE: YELL) is a leading publisher of international telephone directories based in Reading in Berkshire. The Company has its origins in the division of the privatised former British state telecommunications operator BT Group plc which produced the UK version of Yellow Pages. It is listed on the London Stock Exchange and is currently a constituent of the FTSE 250 Index, having been a member of the FTSE 100 Index prior to March 2008.
John Condron is paid an annual salary of £885,000 for his role as Chief Executive. [1]
Contents |
History
In 1966, Post Office Telecommunications - a division of the UK General Post Office, launched the first UK Yellow Pages classified directory in Brighton, Sussex.[2] Yellow Pages were rolled out across the UK by 1973,[3] and became the first information provider on Prestel.
The group launched its iconic J. R. Hartley adverts in 1983, and became a separately identified business within the BT Group after BT was privatised in 1984. The red fronted Business Pages launched in 1985 in Bristol and South Wales, and the group piloted Talking Pages in Brighton and Bristol from 1987.[4] The number for accessing Talking Pages was unified in 1994 to 0800 600 900, and the group launched Yell.com, its internet and now its most public brand, in 1996.[5]
Leveraged buyout
BT restructured in 2001 and agreed to sell the Yell directory business to private equity firms Apax Partners and Hicks, Muse, Tate & Furst (today operating in Europe as Lion Capital LLP) for £2.14 billion/$3.5 billion,[6] making it then the largest non-corporate LBO in European history. Yell bought US directories publisher McLeodUSA for about $600 million the following year,[7] and floated on London's FTSE in 2003.[8]
TransWestern Publishing
In May 2005 Yell announced the acquisition U.S. directory publisher TransWestern Publishing (and its holding company TransWestern Holdings L.P. from a consortium of private equity firms (Thomas H. Lee Partners and CIVC Partners for $1.575 billion (£829 million). TransWestern operated in 25 states and had core positions in California and Texas. The deal went through later in the year, making Yell's U.S. subsidiary Yellow Book the fifth largest directory publisher in the United States at that time.[9]
TransWestern had been acquired by CIVC Partners in 1993 and was used as a vehicle for additional acquisitions of smaller directories publishers in the western US. In 1997, TransWestern completed a leveraged recapitalization in which Thomas H. Lee Partners and Providence Equity Partners acquired a 60% interest in the company, with CIVC retaining a minority interest.[10] In 2001, TransWestern acquired Texas-based WorldPages.com, Inc., a leading print and Internet yellow pages publisher listed on the New York Stock Exchange for $215 million. At the time, TransWestern was the second largest independent publisher of directories.[11]
Recent Acquisitions
In April 2006 Yell agreed to purchase a 59.9% stake in Spanish phone directory firm Telefonica Publicidad e Informacion (TPI) from Telefonica, and launched a bid for the remaining shares which valued TPI at a total of £2.3 billion (€3.3 billion; US$4.1bn). Since then, Yell has bought further capital and in September 2007 reached agreement with the minority shareholders to acquire the remaining 1.28% of what is now named Yell Publicidad.[12]
In July 2006, Yell threatened Yellowikis with legal action, claiming that people will confuse the two organisations.[13]
In 2008 Yell Group purchased the Pindar Set business and renamed it Yell Adworks.[14]
Operations
The Company operates in the classified advertising markets in the UK, US, Spain and Latin America through printed, online and telephone-based media. It is organised as follows:
- UK Printed Directories
- Other UK Products and Services
- Yellow Book USA
- Yell Publicidad
See also
- J. R. Hartley - The man featured in many UK Yellow Pages adverts
References
- ^ "John Condron: Executive Profile & Biography". BusinessWeek. McGraw-Hill. http://investing.businessweek.com/research/stocks/people/person.asp?personId=888518&ric=YELL.L. Retrieved 23 August 2009.
- ^ "Yell.com History - 1960-1969". Yell.com. http://www.yellgroup.com/english/aboutyell-yelluk-yellukhistory-19601969. Retrieved 2008-01-11.
- ^ "Yell.com History - 1970-1979". Yell.com. http://www.yellgroup.com/english/aboutyell-yelluk-yellukhistory-19701979. Retrieved 2008-01-11.
- ^ "Yell.com History - 1980-1989". Yell.com. http://www.yellgroup.com/english/aboutyell-yelluk-yellukhistory-19801989. Retrieved 2008-01-11.
- ^ "Yell.com History - 1990-1999". Yell.com. http://www.yellgroup.com/english/aboutyell-yelluk-yellukhistory-19901999. Retrieved 2008-01-11.
- ^ "Yell.com History - 2000+". Yell.com. http://www.yellgroup.com/english/aboutyell-yelluk-yellukhistory-2000. Retrieved 2008-01-11.
- ^ Yell buys US directories BBC News, 21 January 2002
- ^ Europe's IPO trickle could become a flood Businessweek, 21 July 2003
- ^ Yell Group to buy US phone book rival MSNBC, 17 May 2005
- ^ TransWestern Publishing Company, L.P. Announces $300 Million Recapitalization with Thomas H. Lee Company. 8 September 1997
- ^ TransWestern Publishing to Acquire WorldPages.com; Creates Second-Largest Independent Telephone Directory Company with Strong Presence in Both Print and Online Markets. Business Wire, April 27, 2001
- ^ Yell snaps up Spanish rival TPI BBC News, 28 April 2006
- ^ "Legal threat to wiki listing site". BBC News. 12 July 2006. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/5169674.stm. Retrieved 2006-07-12.
- ^ Pindar sell directory division to Yell Print Week, 8 July 2008
External links
- Yahoo profile
- Yell:UK page about historic advertisements for Yellow Pages
- Video of the J. R. Hartley advert on YouTube (1992 version)
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